


Caught Up

by Strange_Archivist



Series: Everything, Every Things [14]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2019-03-16 02:51:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13627041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Strange_Archivist/pseuds/Strange_Archivist
Summary: It's so the opposite of what he'd been fearing a moment ago, he's stunned.Hopper catches Mike and El smooching. Shameless, garbagey fluff.





	Caught Up

Hopper sometimes can't turn off the paranoid vet/over-observant police officer/government conspiracy discoverer/ in him. Which is usually inconvenient, but today he figures it’s going to serve him well.

He's put on high alert when he sees the Wheeler station wagon parked haphazardly in the drive of the Hopper residence, tire tracks cutting sloppy lines in the recently fallen snow. His dread doubles when he sees the door has been left wide open. In winter. Had they gotten a scare? Did they think someone was after them? It's been years since hearing a peep from anyone at the lab, save Sam Owens, who'd sworn up and down that no one wanted anything to do with the lab anymore, “too much bad publicity”, but still…

“Hello?” Hopper calls out, hand on his still holstered gun.

No answer.

“Mike? El?”

His unease grows with the silence that echoes back to him. Had someone from the lab or whoever finally decided El was too much of a risk alive? Had they taken her? If they had, surely they'd have had to take Wheeler too or just… 

He pulls his gun out and enters the house.

Low voices are coming from the kitchen and Hopper approaches as quietly as he can. If they haven't yet taken or… or killed the kids, maybe he can sneak up on them. Maybe he can… watch as the Wheeler kid pulls off his adopted daughter's snowsuit?

It's so the opposite of what he'd been fearing a moment ago, he's stunned. He’d been so caught up in the instinct of defending, fighting, survival, he can barely muster the coherence to be aghast at what he at first assumes is an act of passion between the two teens.

But he's further confused when instead of throwing themselves at one another, he observes Mike helping El to sit on the counter, easing a thick, wooly sock off her left foot, rolling her leggings up a bit, and examining her ankle with almost comical studiousness.

“Hmm, doesn't look bruised or swollen yet,” the boy says frowning.

“Yes, that's because I'm fine, I told you,” El huffs.

“You said it hurt!” he says, half laughing.

“Right, because I rolled it, Mike. I told you, it's the same as when I rolled my right ankle in gym last year. It hurt for a few days, but then it was fine.”

Mike seems unconvinced. He shifts his focus to her head. “You're sure you didn't bump your head or anything?”

“Yes, Dr. Wheeler,” she says, rolling her eyes.

“Har, har,” Mike says dryly, but smiling, and Hopper suppresses his own grin.

Mike starts going on about how sorry he is,that he should have walked her to her side of the car so she wouldn't have slipped on the ice, but Hopper thinks El has a point when she says they'd probably both have just fallen down. Wheeler ain't exactly known for his grace. Hopper realizes he's essentially spying on them at this point and it's uncomfortable as hell. Relieved they both appear to be fine, he decides to go shut the front door, it is letting all the cold air in.

He works on hanging up his coat and hat after that, hearing them giggle together, hoping they won't get carried away and he won't actually catch them in a real compromising position. Hopper had told Mike “her body, her rules” about a month ago and he'd meant it, but that didn't mean he actually wanted to see them at it.

He's just thinking this as he sets his keys down and turns to leaf through the mail when he catches the two out of the corner of his eye. The giggles had grown louder, then stopped, and he sees now they've stopped because they've found their mouths otherwise occupied.

It's not the first time he's seen them kiss, but he's pretty sure this isn't the sort of kiss they'd be sharing if they knew they had an audience. He's stunned too that they don't realize they've got an audience, he’d made no effort to be quiet shutting the door or putting his keys down, but they're clearly so caught up in eachother he supposes it isn't a surprise they haven't noticed him. They've just barely stepped out of the kitchen and her hand that isn't carrying her snowsuit is a fist clutching his jacket, pulling him down to her. Both Mike's hands are in El's hair and they're practically melted together.

Hopper's stunned into silence again and just grateful they don't stay like that too long.

“You sure you're ok?” Mike asks once they pull away.

“Ugh, yes! I told you, I'll just ice it and keep it up tonight. It'll be fine. I have to go change though, if I stay in all these layers another second inside I'm gonna get a heat rash.”

Mike laughs, and in spite of her words, El kisses him again. For the love of god. Hopper thinks he really ought to make his presence known now, it's just getting awkward, but El breaks off the kiss again and flits off to her room leaving Mike, who now leans up against the wall gazing off into some unknown, dazed distance, looking every bit the part of the stereotypical, swooning ingenue who's been swept off her feet.

He'd have laughed at the boy's lovestruck expression if it hadn't been broken by his eyes finally landing on Hopper.

The look on the boy's face now bottoms out and his eyes avert Hopper's. He'd laugh now too if he weren't pretty sure that would give the kid a heart attack.

“Wheeler,” he instead says in greeting, giving him a meaningful nod, his eyes not leaving the boy's.

“Um. Chief.” The kid still will barely meet his gaze.

Hopper does his best to appear unperturbed, and he mostly is, but he appreciates that Mike has the decency to look uncomfortable.

“We were just-”

Hopper silences him with a hand in the air while he makes his way to his armchair, paper in hand.

“I don't need details kid.”

The boy opens his mouth for a moment, as if to say something indignant, but then seems to decide against it.

Good, Hopper thinks as he shakes out his paper.

“I'm just, um, she rolled her ankle, so I'll go get some ice for her.”

He wipes his nose, not looking up from his paper. “Mmhmm, good idea.”

Mike awkwardly ducks out of the room and Hopper finally lets himself have a chuckle and a sigh at not two seconds after his exit from the room, hearing a thud, like the kid had lost his footing (probably in his haste to get away) and then a, “Everything's fine!” from Mike.

He figures after a while that at least this awkward encounter has served to prevent future ones (and ones of potential greater awkwardness) because he doesn't catch much else around the house after that. Jim's not naive, he was a teenager once too, and figures they've likely simply found other venues. He figures there could be worse things considering how happy El is, and just how often he realizes the boy gives her that same wondering, lovestruck look.

**Author's Note:**

> I've had the idea for this fic for a while, but hadn't been able to figure a good way to end it. I still don't think it ends that well, but, meh.


End file.
